(Exclusive to Che Underground: The Blog, Ray Brandes unearths a Tell-Tale Hearts single with a rich pedigree.)
Heinz Burt was discovered slicing bacon in a Southampton market at age 19. In 1962, he played bass on the Tornados’ smash single “Telstar,” produced by the brilliant but misunderstood Joe Meek, Britain’s first independent pop producer.
Heinz soon became a pet project of Meek’s. Inspired by the movie “Village Of The Damned,” Meek encouraged the young Heinz to bleach his hair white and release a single, “Just Like Eddie,” a tribute to the recently dead Eddie Cochran which reached number 5 on the British pop charts.
Heinz never returned to that altitude on the charts but did record a series of bizarre singles including “Big Fat Spider,” “Country Boy” and “I Get Up in the Morning.” Heinz was sent on tour with Gene Vincent and Jerry Lee Lewis. Meek envisaged Heinz’s audience as teenage girls, but young British audiences booed him and showered him with beans.
More than 20 years later, pop impresario Ron Rimsite commissioned the Tell-Tale Hearts to record a track for his acclaimed fanzine “99th Floor.” Conspiring with producer Mark Neill of the Unknowns, we huddled in Mark’s “three track shack” in Dulzura where we had recorded “The Now Sound of the Tell-Tale Hearts.” The result was a cover of Heinz’s “I Get Up in the Morning,” presented for the first time in 22 years as a Che Underground exclusive. It was an unusual choice of song to say the least, and more than a few fans were surprised/and or put off by the recording!
Historical footnote: The Ampex 300 three-track on which the Tell-Tale Hearts recorded with Mark Neill has a fascinating legacy: It was used as a two-track at Electra Studios, where it was used to record the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, Stooges, the Doors, Love and the MC5. The console was from Studio 2 Western and was used on recordings by the Beach Boys, Johnny Rivers, Nancy Sinatra and the 5th Dimension.
The Tell-Tale Hearts play “I Get Up in the Morning”: Listen now!
— Ray Brandes